In the case of the US and the Soviet Union (now Russia) it led to an arms race that would have enabled each side to blow up each other’s civilisation not just once but many times.

North Korea is today’s hot potato.

Clearly the regime is moving things forward just as fast as it can. But in past years, during the administrations of presidents Bill Clinton, George Bush and Barack Obama, North Korea was prepared to compromise.

Indeed, at one time, before it had the bomb, it slowed developments right down in return for the US and South Korea building it a light-water nuclear reactor.

On two occasions, the Republicans in Congress sabotaged all attempts at compromise after the president had fashioned an agreement, and North Korea returned to full-speed ahead.

However, it does not, yet have (it may in four years’ time) a nuclear-tipped missile capable of reaching the US. Thus, there is still a window of opportunity left for a grand compromise.

India, a military superpower in the not-too-distant future, allows, thanks to Narang’s and many others’ research, a look at what can happen behind the curtain of secrecy.

The first prime minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, abhorred nuclear weapons, but in 1948, in parliament, he did say that if he felt India was truly threatened, he would give the go-ahead.

In the mid-1950s, although India was not threatened in any serious way by Pakistan or China, he initiated the building of a plutonium reactor bought from Canada and a reprocessing facility at Trombay that could produce weapons-grade plutonium.

Nehru’s successor, Lal Shastri, was much more against nuclear weapons than Nehru. Nevertheless, under pressure from nuclear scientists and the opposition, he allowed work to continue on peaceful explosions for “development work”.

This meant that India would soon possess weapons-grade fissile material.

It did not mean engineering nuclear bombs. India maintained that it sought world nuclear disarmament, not bombs of its own.

She too, as she spelt out to this writer in a full-page interview in The International Herald Tribune and The Washington Post, hated the idea of India possessing nuclear weapons, but clearly, by allowing the peaceful test, was hedging her bets.

Her successor, Morarji Desai, was anxious to make a deal with the US.

If the US would sign the Test Ban Treaty and promise to continue to provide enriched uranium for India’s power plants, India would renounce the right to build a bomb.

The US, under president Jimmy Carter, refused the deal.

Gandhi came back to power and then was assassinated. She had felt misled by her scientists and had forbidden any future peaceful explosions.

Her son, Rajiv, took over. He kept a tight rein on what the scientists were up to and made sure that all decisions on research had to be channelled across the prime minister’s desk.

In March 1988, Rajiv did a somersault. He had received definitive evidence that Pakistan was developing nuclear weapons. (Later on, the US and Europe were to turn a blind eye to Pakistan’s bomb developments.)

He also felt his fingers had been burnt by his failure at the UN to get the big powers to take nuclear disarmament seriously. He ordered weaponisation.

All this shows that it is possible to persuade newcomers to renounce nuclear weapons.

There is always a window of opportunity, as North Korea and India show.

There are always successes, as Algeria, Libya, Brazil, Argentina and South Africa demonstrate.

But the US, in particular, has to offer something substantial.

This is what was wrong with Carter’s diplomacy and with President Donald Trump’s policy right now.

Comments

DR SAMUEL IHEMDI (not verified)

Fri, 04/21/2017 - 01:38

THERE IS ONLY ONE WAY TO BANISH NUKES IS TO BANISH IT FOR GOOD WHICH MEANS THAT ALL NATIONS MUST GET RID OF THEM ALL BECAUSE AS LONG AS ANY COUNTRY IS UNDER SEIGE AND BEING BULLED, THEY WILL HAVE NO CHOICE BUT TO GET THE IT ALL ANY COST. LOOK AT THE INDIA VS PAKISTAN, THE MIDDLE EAST, ASIA, EUROPE AND THE LIST GOES ON. THE WORLD SHOULD COME TO A COCLUSION THAT NUKES ARE USELESS BECAUSE NO COUNTRY DARE ATTEMPT TO USE IT BECAUSE RESULTS WILL MARK THE BEGINING OF THE END. EVEN THE POOREST OF THE POOREST CAN BUILD OR BUY THEIR OWN SO WE SHOULD NOT CONTINUE TO WAIT UNTIL A MAD MAN TRIGERS THE BEGINING OF THE END. IF YOU BELEIVE IN THE LAW OF AVERAGE, THEN ITS TIME FOR THE WORLD TO UNITE AND STOP ALL THESE MADNESS.

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The Jordan Times is an independent English-language daily published by the Jordan Press Foundationsince October 26, 1975. The Jordan Press Foundation is a shareholding company listed on the Amman Stock Exchange.